Conference Paper Guidelines

Expectations

The following pages describe the expectations used by the faculty to evaluate the development of your research paper. All parts of the paper must be “fully developed” to meet the MIT program requirement for successfully completing the MIT Conference Paper. The goal is to have a complete, copy-edited paper by June 2007 so you can relax, prepare for student teaching, and/or focus on finishing your endorsement courses during the summer.

 

Suggested procedure for writing the literature review. Also, refer to Galvan (2005).

Literature Review: (15 pages maximum)

  1. Collect information from the most relevant studies or bodies of peer-reviewed research. Be sure to include literature on your topic related to diverse learners. You need a minimum of 30 relevant references, of which at least 15 are scholarly articles and 7 scholarly books and/or chapters from scholarly books.
  2. Compile the studies according to themes or concepts.
  3. Provide a historical overview of the topic.
  4. Summarize the major findings of each study.
  5. Explain the importance of the findings and how they add to the body of knowledge about the topic.
  6. Present the findings in a logical sequence.
  7. Make a connection from one set of findings to the next according to themes or concepts.
  8. Review this section and consider whether the reader would have a comprehensive view of the topic.

 

Rubric by which your paper will be evaluated. You must score a 3 for successful completion.

Literature Review-

 

Begin with an historical overview of the issues and/or controversies. Present the current state of knowledge concerning your topic, including a critical analysis and summary of the recent research.

 

3 The literature review provides all of the following:

  1. Begins with a discussion that specifies particular, significant historical bases for your topic.
  2. Historical overview is connected to the social, cultural, and/or political contexts related to your topic.
  3. A description and categorization of the major points of view on your topic, as revealed in your search of the professional literature. Must include the landmark studies and theorists on your topic.
  4. An analysis and thoughtful discussion of the current state of knowledge on your topic, based on information available in the professional literature, referenced with citations in APA style.
  5. A critical analysis and review of the research that

(a) compares and contrasts major arguments and

(b) analyzes whether the research used to support the argument is sufficient

  1. Makes connections from one set of findings to the next according to themes or concepts.

 

2 The literature review provides only the following:

  1. A discussion of perspectives about the topic but with few citations from the professional literature to support the claims.
  2. Limited number of peer-reviewed sources included in the review.
  3. A descriptive summary of specific studies and/or strategies but with little or no critical review of their strengths and weaknesses.
  4. An incomplete discussion of the research and professional literature.
  5. Lacks clear connections and logical progression.

 

1 The material in this section is based on personal opinion or on professionals’ opinions with few references to research. The review includes lists of suggestions/strategies drawn from the literature with little or no critical assessment of the research upon which these recommendations are based.

 

Avoiding Plagiarism

 

The Master in Teaching (2006) program covenant describes the Requirements of Academic Honesty:

 

All forms of academic dishonesty, including cheating, fabrication, facilitating academic dishonesty, and plagiarism are violations of the Evergreen Social Contract. Plagiarism is defined as representing the works or ideas of another as one’s own in any academic exercise. It includes, but is not limited to, copying materials directly, failing to cite sources of arguments and data, and failing to explicitly acknowledge joint work or authorship of assignments (see also “Evergreen’s Social Contract” regarding “Intellectual freedom and honesty”). (p. 12)

 

The MIT faculty also place cultural appropriation without appropriate acknowledgment and/or permission as a form of academic dishonesty. APA (1994) explains how to avoid plagiarism:

 

Quotation marks should be used to indicate the exact words of another. Summarizing a passage or rearranging the order of a sentence and changing some of the words is paraphrasing. Each time a source is paraphrased, a credit for the source needs to be included in the text…(p.292)

 

When in doubt, cite: over-citation is an error, but under-citation is plagiarism. (Howard, 1995, p. 800)